The Ohio Democrat. (Logan, O. [Ohio]) 1886-1906, 1887-02-05

eye, who suddenly reigned up, stopped
short and shouted:
"Hallo, old cock! have you any par
ticular engagement" And while Bill
Adamson was slowly trying 10 evolve
an answer, he was surprised by another
question:
"Can you shear sheep without cut
ting him all to piecesp"
Adamson fixed his eyes on the frank,
kindly face that looked down upon him,
and gradually finding his voice, said:
~ don't know; but I'll try"
Come on, then!" said Murdoch, rs
he sprang down and hitched his horse
to post. But before he had gone three
steps he turned and leaned against the
wall, with his hands against his side,
shaking with laughter.
YOU'RE q rum customer, you are!
You've never asked me what you're to
getr'
The man dropped his head and kick
ed nervously mt a stone on the ground.
Then he muttered, without looking ut
Murdoch:
"You never asked me-where came
from"
And Murdoch understood. There was
curious twist of perversity in his ma
ture-or some OF his friends SO called
it. Civilized and respectable citizens he
would treat with the sublimcst audacity
of disdain; it was common saying
about him, that he feared nothing and
respected nobody. But for outcasts
and disreputable characters of any sort
he had quick. instructive sympathy.
1t did not take much penetration to
guess the history of the man before him,
and following the impulse of the mo-
ment, he did the very thing to bind that
man to him for life.
"All right, then. Is it bargainp
Shake hands on it!'
So they shook hands, and Bill Adam
son was installed among the shearers;
and afterward, when that nomad tribe
scattered away east and west, to past
ures new, he remained on as one of
the Barangaroo shepherds--a queer,
silent, solitary man, who worked for
three, seldom spoke, and never smiled,
except when Murdoch spoke to him.
He liked the lonely life at the hut on
Stringy-bark hill, where very few were
willing to stay; among the other hands
on the station he was moody, sullen,
and ''difficult;" but the two men who
shared the hut with him found
him "well enough to get on with
lot L., 1,
went on, one day exactly like another,
till they added up into years, and it
seemed to him that he had lived there
all his life. Murdoch came up some-
times-he always. when he could, went
out to the huts himself with the rations,
instead of sending the overseer; or now
and then he would pass by casually
when out shooting, and sit over pipe
before Adamson's fire talking to him in
that frank, trustful way Of his, which
won the hearts of black and white alike.
1t was at such times as these that he
got all Bills history from him, bit by
bit, and deepened into a dumb, dog
like worship the mans first vague adj
miration. / do not know whether Bill
Adamson had ever loved anyone or
any thing in his life bcfore-I do not
know that he loved Lennox Murdoch.
And now Gibson had brought the
news that Lennox Murdoch lay dying
at Barangaroo. can not try to follow
and analyze the wild, formlesss
thoughts that worked daily in that dark
brain of his. A superstitious sailor to
begin with, brooding for weeks together
over his own thoughts in the bush,
it is in truth scarcely to be Won
dered at if his ideas of the
Unseen were not much higher than
those of the bronze -colored savages
who would come and eat themselves
stupid on Murdoch's mutton and damp
er round their campfres near his hut.
He believed in the existence of Higher
Power, whose name he sometimes used
in oaths, and to whom, when more rev.
erently inclined, he vaguely referred
but this rarely happened-as They"
and, in sort of way, in the efficacy of
prayer, though his views on the subject
were peculiar. They came in rs usual,
and settled down to their supper and
their customary monosyllabic talk.
just at last, before they turned in for
the night, one of them happened to ask
him whether he had seen any one that
day. He answered in his slow drawl,
as he knocked the ashes out of his pipe
against his knee
"Gibson from Murray's was here
this afternoon. Came past Baranga-
roo. Says the boss is real bad. Got
hurt with tree falling on him."
There was dead silence. Then the
two interchanged comments and ques-
tions in low voice, and finally, after
having tried in vain to get more lucid
information from him. they turned
away and wrapped themselves in their
blankets, leaving him still smoking by
the fire. Thereupon he looked up and
said: "One o. you stay here tomorrow
II wanter to 60 down and see how he
Isl" to which they answered "All
right" and were asleep in few min
utes.
He sat still, watching the dying en-
bers for some time longer; then he rose
slowly, put in his pocket the flint and
steel and tinderbox he always carried,
stuck his knife in his belt, felt for and
found the tin pannikin which served
him for drinking cup, and, opening
the door softly, went out. There was
no moon, but it was bright starlight,